Down syndrome

My last post was about Amy Julia Becker’s powerful book, A Good and Perfect Gift, about her daughter Penny who has Down syndrome. The book raises wonderful questions about the value of human life, all human life and not just the lives that include advanced degrees and things our society values most. And since we at SPACIOUS are all about being open to “otherness,” to people we might not normally know or connect with, I’ve found that this book has broadened my thinking on such things.

My friend, author Amy Julia Becker is Princeton-educated, intelligent, physically attractive, and from a world of relative privilege. And she unexpectedly gave birth to a daughter with Down syndrome.

In the hospital after delivery, she and her husband Peter scrambled to learn about Down syndrome as they reeled and grieved over the news that had flipped their lives upside down, even as they tried to welcome Penny, the child they had anticipated so keenly and now held in their arms.